


The Last Time

by LunaD11



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast), The Adventure Zone: Balance (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Ficlet, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2018-12-26 04:59:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12051828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaD11/pseuds/LunaD11
Summary: (Spoilers for TAZ 65) Small bit of Taako's character study for Lup's transition into a lich.





	The Last Time

They knew. They knew they'd come back at the end of each cycle. No matter how brutally or early on they died, they'd always come back. Even with this knowledge, this permanent security, it didn't make the deaths any easier. After the first dozen times people grew numb to death, to loneliness...but that first few times... Pain. Sorrow. Relentless and unforgiving was the pit each one was knocked into when one of the crew perished. Just the thought of- the possibility of them not returning. It shattered them.

And Taako was no different.

Lup becoming a lich was like starting this journey all over again. This time Taako had no reassurance that Lup would survive, that she'd come back in the next cycle. He had almost forgotten what that despair felt like.

But Taako trusted his twin, and if Barry was on board as well, well... all the more reason to have faith in them.

After Barry and Lup grasped hands and whispered incantations, Taako gripped his heart. He felt like he was floating. He began to pray to every god and spirit he could think of, begging to keep them safe. In an instant their bodies fell limp, it was jarring and unexpected. His stomach flipped in knots as he took an unconscious step forward. In that moment Taako watched an entire lifetime flash before him, one without his sister. 

One. Two. Three seconds went by.

Taako couldn't breathe. Nothing was happening. Was this nightmare truly real? So much of him was reliant on Lup, she was a part of who he was. Taako took another step forward. He thought about ending the cycle early rather than being forced to wait out the rest of it wondering if they would even return once they left this plane. But just as Taako stepped forward, ready to give up hope, two astral projections floated up from the lifeless bodies of his comrades. The two shadowy figures were red cloaked and ashen, no sense of permanency or physical form. Red electricity cracked and spun around them. Dark clouds billowed, a miasma of dark energy. They jittered in and out of space, uncontrollable. For a second Taako felt threatened, fearing that the magic may have consumed them.

But once the electricity died the figures floated to the ground and smiled at eachother. The one on the left fell back down into Barry's body, but the one on the right stayed, staring at Taako. Taako couldn't form a word in his head, everything felt so far away. The figure smiled at him and in that instant all of Taako's anxiety dissipated, leaving him feeling weak enough to collapse on the ground. Lup, now extatic at the success, quickly dabbed before returning to her own body. That was it for Taako. He collapsed to his knees as he shook, half laughing half crying in relief as a few tears fell past his eyelids and onto the ground.

_It worked. She's safe._

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a little disappointed they didn't go into more detail about Lup's transition into a lich and Taako's reaction to having that information dumped on him. Not to mention the amount of pressure making her potentially last day alive the best day ever. I feel like Taako wouldn't have just blindly supported Lup like he did in that chapter, but would have argued with her some. I mean Lup barely gave Taako enough information about how and why before he was like "Alright I'll just bottle up just how not okay I am and support you." I might do another one that takes place during that time...


End file.
